Taylor Phinney (BMC) has confirmed to Cyclingnews that he is targeting the opening time trial stage of the Dubai Tour on Wednesday, and is confident he has the form to take his first victory of 2014.

Phinney faces serious competition from Fabian Cancellara (Trek Factory Racing), Tony Martin (Omega Pharma-Quick Step) and Adriano Malori (Movistar). Riders at the Dubai Tour will be using normal road bikes for the 9.9km out-and-back course in the shadow of the skyscrapers in the Dubai business district, perhaps giving Phinney an advantage.

“I’ve thought about this race for a couple of months now and ever since it came out that it started with a 10km time trial and then flat stages after that, I knew I could come here and be competitive,” he told Cyclingnews.

“You can obviously see that the field is very deep, with guys like Fabian (Cancellara), Tony Martin and (Adriano) Malori, who already beat me in Argentina.”

“I’ve been doing a lot of time trial specific work on my road bike and so I do come here quite confident, knowing I have good fitness. We’ll put it out on the road and see what everyone else has.”

Early season time trial targets

Phinney will target time trials in early season stage races before heading to Belgium for the cobbled Classics.

“I’ve had a different built up, with regards to my race programme. I’ve been given races that have time trials in the early season, to try and get some results going before we jump into the Classics,” he said.